


Pre-Existing Conditions

by Nihonkikuasa211



Category: Code Black (TV)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Neonatal Abstinence Sydrome, Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, Past Drug Addiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-02
Updated: 2016-09-02
Packaged: 2018-08-12 12:23:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7934494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nihonkikuasa211/pseuds/Nihonkikuasa211
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A lone young man was standing in front of a plane made out of glass. His eyes were dark brown, the iris about pure black as the young man wearing scrubs stared beyond the material. Dark blue scrubs were what he wore. Although the ID printed in red, bold, and capital letters that he was a doctor, the dark-haired resident didn’t feel like one.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pre-Existing Conditions

_Pre-Existing Conditions_

             

              A lone young man was standing in front of a plane made out of glass. His eyes were dark brown, the iris about pure black as the young man wearing scrubs stared beyond the material. Dark blue scrubs were what he wore. Although the ID printed in red, bold, and capital letters that he was a doctor, the dark-haired resident didn’t feel like one.

              Mario Savetti’s eyes wandered over the many incubators in Angels neonatal intensive care unit. Wires and incubators were everywhere, nurses and doctors taking monitoring their patients vital signs. A lump formed in Mario’s throat at the thought of the word patient. When he had first arrived in Angels, the dark-haired man from a poor family didn’t give a shit about the people he was supposed to help. He had no tact; no character and only looked out for himself. Mario felt like a fraud compared to the other residents that had applied and had gotten into the most rigorous emergency medicine program in the United States. So many times he hadn’t cared about why the patients were there; of how he had asked a young teen if his girlfriend had died; then after some reluctance, the then-first year resident had asked if the teen’s boyfriend had died. Mario had gotten spit on his face. _I deserved that,_ Mario thought as he heaved a breath deep from his lungs at the intensity of the most recent memory pounding in his mind. _How did I go from that...to now?_ The indignant rage still burned in his mind; of how close he had been to grabbing the woman’s shirt and yelling at her what she had done. The touch of Angus’ hand around his wrist had made him pause. Mario had perhaps expected shock in the fellow resident’s eyes, but found himself staring into the abyss of understanding. So much had happened in the last six months since Mario had suspected that his friend was abusing Adderall.

              Angus had managed to get clean. Hell, it hadn’t been easy, but Mario had coached him through it. He still remembered the calls that came at any time of the day after a week of silence, thinking that Mario would be ashamed of Angus, or hound him of why he started using in the first place. _“You don’t have to tell me anything.”_ The naked relief on his friend’s face was enough for Mario to rest his hand on the resident’s broader shoulder. _“Just tell me when you’re ready, or not.”_ He had told his friend that he didn’t care what had happened; Mario had seen and done some dark shit, and had heard others’ histories, or stories, from the time he had simply been a drug addicted teen with a foul attitude forced to go to rehab. The only stark difference between the track-marked scarred resident and Angus was that his friend had wanted to get better.

              Mario stared sadly at what he was seeing across from him. The high-pitched cries still echoed firmly in his mind, having heard them before during his rotation as an intern. Too many people didn’t realize of how their drug addiction destroyed people’s lives. His own parents hadn’t noticed, too intent on their search for the high for any child, including one as screwed-up as him, to be any help life. People who had tried to help, and those very close the person he had been would be betrayed – through lies, stealing precious money or items, and their trust. But something about neonatal abstinence syndrome caused Mario’s view to shift. He understood why he was so angry. Of why he had almost assaulted a patient who didn’t even care that she was pregnant and _continued_ using. The short shagged hair with grease and the smell of homelessness rebreathed through Mario’s mind, his anger towards the drug-addicted mother increasing as he remembered of how he and Angus had been forced to do an emergency C-section on her in Trauma One. He remembered the feel of the baby’s crown as Mario pulled the baby from the poisonous cage that had imprisoned him, relief pounding through his heart at the sound of the cry that tore from the baby’s lips. Holding the male infant’s head gently, Mario transferred him to a cot. Somehow Mario had found himself washing the amniotic fluid from the baby’s skin as Angus began to close the C-section, wiping the umbilical cord and instructing Charlotte to transport the baby to the neonatal intensive care unit. Even Angus had asked why, and Mario again saw the shocked looks on both of their faces as he explained to them that opioids, including heroin and methadone, was passed to the fetus through the umbilical cord. _“It’s not every drug,”_ he had added. Thankfully the infant had been taken to the neonatal intensive care by the team of doctors and a nurse before Angus and the new resident could ask him anymore questions.

              The mother had left days later. It didn’t surprise Mario, but it still left a hole in his stomach. Who would take care of this baby? The child protective services would often state that they would be able to find a home for any baby, but who would want to take care of a child with that kind of history? Mario had been one of those who the services turned a blind-eye to; it was a pure miracle that his third grade teacher had been able to keep him as long as she did, and of how he had pleaded with them that he didn’t want to go back. Anything but going back to the destroyed hell that was his eight-year old life. The services didn’t care.

              Mario looked at the incubator on the most left side of the room. Apparently to the doctors there, the baby hadn’t been given a name yet; he was only known as Baby Olsen. Tufts of brown hair covered his head, and for now the baby was sleeping peacefully. His parents hadn’t been drug addicts when he was born; they used sparingly in those days. According to his high mother, life had been fabulous before him; getting laid and drinking until sunrise, joking at crude jokes with his asshole father, pissing off her selfish mother, who was worried about her daughter and an annoyance in their life. Mario still remembered wondering why his parents didn’t want him, thinking back then to his happy first grade teach Mrs. Fuser, who was going to have a baby. His entire class had been shouting names, the small boy he had been shrinking in his seat. According to his mother, he had been named after a dog that died; her dog, specifically. The little boy had been perplexed to hear his mother crying and muttering inherently after her puppy. Mario often didn’t think about the name given to him; it was simply that, a name. But perhaps he didn’t think about his name because of the absence of love and care. Mario had been named after a dog. A more loved dog than he himself.

              One time Mario had looked up the meaning of his name – some stupid project his middle school had done. He had been surprised to find that his name meant god of war. As a boy suited to fights and broken bones, the name suited him. A life of violence, and not of healing was his world. Although the baby infant was only days old, Mario had suddenly thought of a name. It would be a good name. Not like one given to him as afterthought, with hardly any good history behind it.

                _Jason..._ his thirteen year old self had thought with a frown as he stared at the words. _Name meaning: healer._ Hardly a moment had passed before he had thought, _What a sisisy name._

              “Jason,” Mario whispered. He licked his lips, not being able to say the right words. Instead, he found himself saying, "Let's hope you have a better beginning than I had."


End file.
